GenAI adoption surges in healthcare but security hurdles remain

Ninety-nine percent of healthcare organisations are now making use of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI), according to new global research from Nutanix, but almost all say they face challenges in data security and scaling these technologies to production.

The findings are drawn from the seventh annual Healthcare Enterprise Cloud Index (ECI) report by Nutanix, which surveyed 1,500 IT and engineering decision-makers across multiple industries and regions, including the healthcare sector. The research highlights both rapid uptake of GenAI in healthcare settings and significant ongoing barriers around infrastructure and privacy.

GenAI use widespread, but risks loom

Among healthcare organisations surveyed, a striking 99% said they are currently leveraging GenAI applications or workloads, such as AI-powered chatbots, code co-pilots and tools for clinical development automation. This sector now leads all other industries in GenAI adoption, the report found.

However, nearly as many respondents—96%—admitted their existing data security and governance were not robust enough to support GenAI at scale. Additionally, 99% say scaling from pilot or development to production remains a serious challenge, with integration into existing IT systems cited as the most significant barrier to wider deployment.

"In healthcare, every decision we make has a direct impact on patient outcomes - including how we evolve our technology stack," said Jon Edwards, Director IS Infrastructure Engineering at Legacy Health. "We took a close look at how to integrate GenAI responsibly, and that meant investing in infrastructure that supports long-term innovation without compromising on data privacy or security. We're committed to modernising our systems to deliver better care, drive efficiency, and uphold the trust that patients place in us."

Patient data privacy and security concerns underpin much of this hesitation. The number one challenge flagged by healthcare leaders is the task of integrating GenAI with legacy IT infrastructure (79%), followed by the continued existence of data silos (65%) and ongoing obstacles in developing cloud-native applications and containers (59%).

Infrastructure modernisation lags adoption

The report stresses that while GenAI uptake is high, inadequate IT modernisation could impede progress. Scaling modern applications such as GenAI requires updated infrastructure solutions capable of handling complex data security, integrity, and resilience demands. Respondents overwhelmingly agree more must be done in this area.

Key findings also indicate that improving foundational data security and governance will remain an ongoing priority. Ninety-six percent agree their organisations could still improve the security of their GenAI models and applications, while fears around using large language models (LLMs)—especially with sensitive healthcare data—are prevalent.

Scott Ragsdale, Senior Director, Sales - Healthcare & SLED at Nutanix, described the recent surge in GenAI adoption as a departure from healthcare's traditional technology adoption timeline. "While healthcare has typically been slower to adopt new technologies, we've seen a significant uptick in the adoption of GenAI, much of this likely due to the ease of access to GenAI applications and tools. Even with such large adoption rates by organisations, there continue to be concerns given the importance of protecting healthcare data. Although all organisations surveyed are using GenAI in some capacity, we'll likely see more widespread adoption within those organisations as concerns around privacy and security are resolved."

Nearly all healthcare respondents (99%) acknowledge difficulties in moving GenAI workloads to production, driven chiefly by the challenge of integrating with existing systems. This indicates that, despite wide experimentation and early deployments, many organisations remain cautious about full-scale rollouts.

Containers and cloud-native trends

In addition to GenAI, the survey found a rapid expansion in the use of application containerisation and Kubernetes deployments across healthcare. Ninety-nine percent of respondents said they are at least in the process of containerising applications, and 92% note distinct benefits from cloud-native application adoption, such as improved agility and security.

Container-based infrastructure is viewed as crucial for enabling secure, seamless access to both patient and business data over hybrid and multicloud environments. As a result, many healthcare IT decision-makers are expected to prioritise modern deployment strategies involving containers for both new and existing workloads.

Respondents continue to see GenAI as a path towards improved productivity, automation and efficiency, with major use cases involving customer support chatbots, experience solutions, and code generation tools. Yet, the sector remains grappling with the challenges of scale, security, and complexity inherent to these new technologies.

The Nutanix study was conducted by Vanson Bourne in Autumn 2024 and included perspectives from across the Americas, EMEA and Asia-Pacific-Japan.